Nopah Range, Pahrump Point

30-Apr-94

By: John McCully, Edna Erspamer, Carol Smetana

We met at the turn off to Nopah at 6:30 and after enough floundering on the part of the leader to give the participants a proper sense of chaos we stumbled onto the tree at twelve mile spring. Route C is touted in the peaks guide as being the longest but easiest way to do the peak and we began the 1-1/2 mile trudge across the desert floor that this route entails just before 8. My compass turned out to be defective but Torn Sumner generously loaned me his so that I could take a guess at the appropriate ridge. The route did offer a minimum of boulder hopping, and Edna felt that it was easier than the route she used several years ago. Everyone was on top by one and back to the car before six. Almost everyone headed for the Tecopa Hot Springs, so we got to the campsite in the cliffs East of Shoshone fairly late, about 7:30 or so. Carol and I had brought several pounds Of fancy meat balls but I managed to dump the whole caboodle into the sand. Thus our dog Chessie and a Black Labrador that somehow scratches out a living at the campsite had a real picnic. I wonder what happened to the sand on the meat balls?

Edna Erspamer handled the assist on Nopah and wanted to take Sunday off so I got a special one time permission from Bob Hicks for Carol Smetana to assist Sunday. Carol's "O" rating couldn`t normally cut it on an interesting peak like Pahrump. Sunday we hit the road at 7 and the last person trudged off Pahrump by 1:45. In a fit of absent mindedness I indicated in the schedule that this was a good trip for beginners. In the future maybe I'11 save that designation of peaks a little easier than these two. Coming home we got stuck in a traffic jam just this side of Barstow and I cleverly waited until a patrolman was coming the other way before making my U-turn. He wrote me up without further ado. Participants were Tom Sumner, Edna Erspamer, Tom Erspamer, Paula Peterson, Dorothy Danziger, John Connelly, Jim Fujimoto, Janet Strom, Doug Jones, John McCully, Carol Smetana, Jones, and Bob Tomlinson participated. Dorothy and Edna skipped Pahrump.